My Novel, My Life

One of the coolest things about NANOWRIMO is getting emails of encouragement and tips from famous authors. In Week Three we--all 200,000 of us -- got an email from Janet Fitch, author of White Oleander and Paint it Black. She is one of my favorite authors, and I consider White Oleander one of the most beautiful books about Los Angeles ever written. She evoked the Los Angeles I know, as a reporter and a person. She captures the mood and poetry and pain of every part of this city her character moves through.
She told us to push our characters over a cliff. She said their characters are formed, the story is laid out, now it is time to literally, write them into a horrible situation they must struggle with, act in, get out of. She said (I am paraphrasing slightly here) that in real life we often fail to act, and sit stuck in the same situation for days, months, years. But it is action that makes stories, novels and for interesting copy. So tonight I will kill off one of my characters. That was one revelation.
But the other was that it is time to act in real life. Life is hard, the economy is crashing, Hollywood is slowed to a standstill. Jonathan and I could sit and watch our world disappear, trying to hold onto what we wish were still true, or we could act, and be characters in our own story, in a story we will never ever forget. It is time to push ourselves over a cliff. To act. To write our own stories. To live the most interesting life possible.
I don't want anyone to die.
But I think we are getting ready for a dramatic change.